The Warmth of a Coat
by Mia-Zeklos
Summary: Ianto suffers from his own bad judgement.


**Author's Notes: This was originally a prompt and it sort of got out of my control because of how terribly fond I am of Ianto's love for Jack's coat. I hope you enjoy it!**

Ianto was ready to do a lot of things to improve a certain situation, regardless of their nature. Admitting he was wrong, however, was not one of them. Especially when he'd been warned beforehand just how wrong he was going to be.

Initially, he and Jack had come out on a dinner. The restaurant had been rather fancy and close to Ianto's flat, so he'd ditched the idea of an overcoat altogether. What would be the point? His suit was made of wool, after all, and there'd been proper heating during their dinner, so he'd dressed in his favourite Armani with a black dress shirt and called it a day.

Things had quickly got out of their control after that, as was typical for most social outings where Torchwood was involved. They'd barely been halfway through an admittedly lovely meal when Jack's pocket had buzzed with the Rift alarm's signal and they'd had to pay up and rush out for a signal that, while not too far from them, required them to stumble in the darkness for quite a bit.

As of now, Ianto was regretting most of the decisions he'd made in the last few hours. He was freezing, he couldn't feel anything further than his wrists and his face was starting to sting with the cold. He was pretty sure his cheekbones had long since gone red from then chilly winter air and his mood was growing worse by the second.

Jack, on the other hand, seemed to be at the peak of his mood. Ianto would have been curious about the artefact too, normally, but not under those conditions and he was getting more and more irritated by Jack's constant remarks and jokes, no matter how irrational it was.

"Are you all right?" he asked, turning around to face Ianto, a mix between concern and mild agitation passing over his features as he studied him carefully. "I told you to bring a coat. You could have taken your suit jacket, if not anything else."

"I'm not cold!" Ianto snapped with a little more heat than was really necessary. Jack was right – he'd picked Ianto up from his flat for their date and had warned him that the temperature outside had dropped rapidly, but Ianto had quickly waved him off; he'd already had his outfit planned out by then. There was no way he'd own up to his bad judgement now, even if he felt that the choice would be taken out of his hands soon. He'd have to admit he had a problem if his fingers started getting any bluer than they already were. "It's not that bad, really."

A small, aggravating smile was playing on Jack's lips and it only served to darken Ianto's mood further. "Your cheeks are red, you know." Not that anything else was to be expected, Ianto thought grimly. The Captain stepped closer to him and ran his fingers over Ianto's cheekbones. "You're ice cold."

Ianto leant into the temptingly warm caress for a moment and then stepped away, cursing himself for his weakness. "We need to find the alien," he reminded sternly.

Jack grinned. "Of course we do," he quipped and turned around, his hands disappearing back into his impossibly deep coat pockets as he continued his leisure stroll.

What Ianto wouldn't have given just then for a coat like that. He could feel the cold seeping through his trousers and his shirt and he wrapped his arms around himself surreptitiously, trying to preserve what little warmth he had left without appearing too desperate for it. Not that he had Jack fooled, as evinced by their recent exchange, but there was still his dignity to be considered.

Half an hour and much more wandering around the dark streets of Cardiff later, they finally found it. It turned out to be a jewel of some kind that had fallen through the Rift and Ianto's only consolation was the fact that it was coming from the future and they couldn't have left it lying about anyway, so their efforts hadn't been completely in vain.

"Can we get back now, please?" Ianto asked peevishly and Jack threw him yet another smile over his shoulder.

"Why the hurry?" he asked breezily and Ianto scowled at him. He was eyeing the coat more and more frequently, however, and decided that it was time to be blunt if he wanted to survive the next few minutes.

"Share your coat, will you?" he asked briskly. "I forgot mine."

Jack gave him a dazzling grin. "I knew we'd get to that," he said, gleefully ridding himself of his already-unbuttoned coat and handing it to Ianto. "There you go."

"We can both fit under that if we try hard enough," Ianto protested. "I don't want you to freeze to death because of me."

"We'll be inside soon," Jack assured him. "And I want you to see you wear it for once."

Ianto didn't hesitate any further. He'd always wanted to try it on, but he'd never really mentioned it. It wasn't that Jack wouldn't have let him, but he'd felt some sort of reverence for it that had prevented him from doing it.

Even now, no matter how cold he was, he took it and donned it with the usual respect he felt for it. The texture was strangely scratchy and yet comforting and, as he felt it wrap around him, he cherished the weight of it on his shoulders.

It only occurred to him after a few seconds that Jack was calling to him. "Huh?"

"I said, 'come back to Earth'," Jack said and Ianto noticed that he'd mimicked his position from a few minutes ago and had wrapped his arms around himself. "You should have said that you liked it so much."

"As if it wasn't obvious already," Ianto said, more prone to teasing now that he wasn't freezing. The coat was just a bit baggy on him and he felt ridiculously comfortable inside it. He caught up with Jack and together they hurried back to his flat.


End file.
